By the time some of you will read this, Claudine will have started her first day at school. She’s familiar with the building and familiar with the rooms and the general curriculum. After all she’s gone with us to drop off and pick up Mia since she was a newborn and has taken classes there herself for the past 2 years. This, however, has not made the anxiety of starting school any less stressful for any of us. She’s not used to being dropped off and she won’t be familiar with the new teachers.

I don’t know if you can tell what kind of personality MIss C has through the stories and photos from this blog, but I capture her at her purest, most comfortable and chatty self. In reality though, if you were to meet her in the street, she would probably hide behind my legs, cover her face and not acknowledge you, not because she is being rude, but because she is really shy. Although I’ve seen improvements over the past year, it takes a while for Claudine to warm up to new people, and it becomes an even greater challenge if you happen to be a guy. You have to earn her trust, but when you do, you will be rewarded with the silliest faces, some of the wittiest banter from a 3 year old that you will ever hear and a personality with equal parts charm and goofiness (I believe she’s now the goofiest person in the house).

That said, we are not expecting the morning to be easy at all. We’re not really sure what to expect.

ps. a blog reader commented that she thought Claudine was much older, like 5, not 3 years old. She’s a super tall kid, taller than anyone else her age we know and even taller than some 4 year olds we know. She’s also very verbal and draws like a 5/6 year old. Also, she has a very big head. Seriously, that kid has the roundest head I’ve ever seen. I know it’s because their head shapes are very different (Mia’s head is a lot more narrow), but Mia’s bike helmet won’t even fit on Claudine. Like not even close.

Oh, hello there, baby Claudine. See? Big, round head. (baby c photo credit: chardean)

My friend Sara Jensen jokingly made fun of me for tweeting from a hike that we went on last Sunday, just north of Seattle. But I wasn’t ready for a hike because I thought we were just going to the playground. We decided to hike down to the water on a whim when we saw there were multiple trails. If you passed me on the trail you would have totally laughed. I hiked a moderately difficult trail (so the sign said) in ballet flats and a fairly dressy drop waist silk tunic over jeans (we were going out to dinner that evening). Ridiculous! Soooo not Pacific Northwest. But whatever. I haven’t gone on a hike in awhile, but even when I was doing some serious hiking many years ago, with heavy packs for camping no less, I didn’t own hiking boots back then either.

This hike, on the other hand, was the girls’ first. For being 3 years old with little legs and wearing sandals over socks, Claudine did quite well on that narrow, steep-ish trail. We got through the hike on the way back from Lake Union by pretending to get on and off the “hiking bus” and discovering fun things like that fungus? unidentifiable green thing? above that I told the girls was a pointy hat that a gnome left there. I don’t know if they bought it, but I’d like to think that it was true.

And so is this blog. You knew I had many more photos to share, right? Besides, we’re still on vacation time, although Mark is getting ready to do his first epic 14 hour night shift tonight (I guess he really isn’t on vacation time then with this rude awakening…welcome home!). It made us realize that 2 full weeks is really a long time to be off on vacation and now he’s playing catch-up with all our retailers. Throughout our trip I kept thinking how taking 2 weeks off to go hang out in Seattle or anywhere else would be really difficult/downright impossible once we have a store. People don’t close down stores for 2 weeks at a time, do they? When we’re gone from our business it’s tough enough as it is, but we aren’t necessarily losing money right now because we aren’t paying any rent anywhere, we’re just not making any money when we’re closed.

It’s this loss of freedom that I lament the most, even though I’ve come around to really embracing the idea of a store. We even scouted out some Northwest goodies to carry in the store, including coffee. Although our own products in the store* will be very much about Brooklyn, we’d like to offer some items from the NW as a connection to Mark’s hometown. It’s stuff like this that gets us excited (also Three Potato Four’s new store which is fab).

I’m hoping to push out of these post-vacation doldrums soon before I waste September away (yes, it is indeed September!!). But for now, my mind is still on vacation, hazy from good times spent with our family and our friends. Coming back hasn’t been easy because there is a lot of uncertainty in our future and it was nice to not have to deal with reality for a bit.

But I will, once the fog lifts away.

*don’t get too excited about the store. There still are no concrete store plans yet, nor any space scouting. The whole thing is still ridiculously daunting.

**oh man, Mark left at midnight after 2 hours of sleep to go bake. He won’t be back till 3 or 4 the next afternoon. We may have to reconsider this strategy. Madness!

Because I’m not. This one was taken at Golden Gardens, Seattle on Saturday night.

We’re actually back home after a long, tedious day of travel. It’s a million degrees in New York. We got in at 6pm and I surprised myself by unpacking. I loathe unpacking, but this time around I wanted to get it over with instead of letting it sit around for days (of which I have done many times). But the first thing I did when we got in the door was mop the floor. After putting in a load of laundry.

Don’t get fooled by this productivity because I’m totally out of sorts. It’s really weird to come home after being away for 2 full weeks. It’s familiar but it’s also not and I found myself checking to see if things were as we left them. We haven’t seen our stuff in so long.

We got up in the morning at 4:30 am to head to the airport. I figured with the early wake up call, we’d all be tired earlier and it’d cancel out the jet lag so we’d go to sleep at a reasonable NY hour. That only worked on 2 of us.

“Sometimes I sneeze when I get excited because it’s like blowing confetti out of my nose. ” – Mia

“I have a lot in common with Daphne from Scooby Doo. I’m pretty. I’m popular. I sometimes wear the same outfit 3 days in a row. I also wear a headband.” – Mark’s sister’s 8 year old neighbor

“I’m allergic to unicorns.” – Claudine

“Sometimes when I get excited I don’t show it. I just wiggle my toes instead.” – Mia

“Do you know Lady Gaga? What?!? You live in NY and you don’t know Lady Gaga??” – the same 8 year old neighbor to Mia

(rolls eyes) “I think everyone in the whole wide world knows by now that Mia was in the hospital.” – Claudine

\

Pike Place Market is crazy crowded, even on a weekday, but even though you think you might skip the visit, you just know that in the end, you have to end up going. We bought a whole bunch of clams, fish, mussels and corn from the market and cooked them in one pot for dinner that evening. Because we’re staying with friends and family, we’re not so much trying to play tourist as we are just trying to live as we would at home. I could easily imagine living here, I think, but it’s taken at least a few visits to come to this. Mark and I joked around that we could retire here when we are old and no longer working. Either that or Hawaii.

Aside from the bizarre day yesterday, we’ve been having so much fun in Seattle. I feel happy here. I think I may have figured out why. I need to be by the ocean and perhaps that’s why Portland never truly felt like home, even with a river that ran through the city. I like the network of lakes, inlets, bays, islands and ferries. New York and Long Island is laid out in a similar manner, though with an entirely different feel. The water is not even something that I need to see, it’s something that I feel or sense, I think. It’s something that is comforting, that feels like home.

Lecia’s house happens to have a view of the water. There is a small strip of beach close to the house. Finally…a dramatic sunset.

Thanks again for all the well wishes. Mia seems to be responding well to medication and she’s bounced back, almost good as new, but man…was she ever pissed about being in the hospital. She made sure to tell me how pissed she was, all day today.

We’ve been in Seattle since Monday (I’m a few days behind in the way of posts) and Wednesday turned out to be the kind of day we least expected.

First of all, I’d like to thank Lecia and Alexi for their incredible hospitality. We are staying with them this week and they couldn’t be more gracious and helpful, especially today.

We had plans to wake up early and ride the ferry to Bainbridge Island and drive to the Dungeness Spit. We made it on to the ferry and Alexi, who happens to be a doctor, suggested we stop by the medical clinic in town as soon as we got off the ferry to get Mia’s swollen knee checked out. I had noticed that her knee had been warm to the touch, and the warmth, redness and swelling seemed to have spread even during the time we were on the ferry. After an exam, we were advised to head straight back to the ferry and check Mia into the ER at the Seattle Children’s Hospital.

I suppose there’s a moment in every parent’s lives when your child is hurt or sick and you have to take them to the ER or hospital. I guess we’ve been lucky so far. This was our first visit with either kid. Mia wasn’t happy that she got stuck at the hospital while the other kids played. She wasn’t happy that she wasn’t allowed to eat or drink the entire 6 hrs we were there. She wasn’t happy with the needles and IV. She got to watch lots of TV though as we waited around to get blood drawn, lab tests and her knee x-rayed. There was a period where I was starting to really worry. There were all kinds of talks about septic arthritis, infection in the joints and possibly down in her bone, admittance to the hospital for a few days, and possibly missing our plane ride home next Tuesday if prolonged anti-biotic treatment through an IV was required.

In the end, the doctors consulted and decided that she had enough white blood cells to send her home and fight it with an oral antibiotic and a close watch on the knee. We have to go back on Monday for a followup to make sure the antibiotics are doing their job.

On the other side of town, Mark was dealing with a sudden flat tire that was discovered in the morning and a dead car battery that was discovered later that day as he was trying to make his way up to the hospital. It was real nutty.

When they gave Mia the green light to eat, she chose to have apples, gold fish, and a half size can of lemon lime soda. She was pretty happy to see Claudine when she got discharged. We drove to Mark’s sisters place for dinner and came back to Lecia’s with just 1 kid. Claudine wanted to have a sleepover with her aunt, but Mia wanted to stay with us because she was worried about her knee. As we left Claudine there and drove away, I realized that we had never been away from her before. The girls have never slept apart. Mia said she was going to miss her. Another first in a day of firsts.

…which has my heart.

Turning the corner towards the public access to the beach, with the first view of Haystack Rock, made my heart ache. Like I was waiting to feel this feeling all trip long.

It’s been a good 14 years since I’ve been back. Even before I made the Northwest my home I spent a few summer weeks on Cannon Beach with my then boyfriend’s family, who rented a house every year for the month of July. When I moved out west, I stayed with them again for a few weeks the next 2 summers. The Oregon Coast was a special place for them and when his parents finally retired, they made it their permanent home.

Walking the beach at dusk on that cloudy Saturday evening with the kids, I thought about that first summer here, 20 years ago. I remember the early morning walks, the fridge that was always full of berries and freshly washed lettuce, dried and stored in Tupperware containers, and I remember the spectacular sunsets. His parents were like family to me – we were close – and having had 5 boys of their own, I think they enjoyed having a girl around the house. Even after the boy and I split up after 3 years, I kept in touch with the parents through letters and holiday cards.

I haven’t been in touch with them in well over 12 years, but I thought about them hard that evening. The last I heard, the father had some health issues and they may have even taken an apartment in Portland to be closer to the hospital. Though I don’t know for sure, I had a strong sense that he wasn’t around anymore. It made me sad. It made me sadder still that I hadn’t kept in touch.

We may promise and have the best intentions to keep in touch with the people who are important in our lives, but sometimes it does not always work out to be. Sometimes, certain relationships run their course and in the end…you have to let go.

Oh Portland, you confuse me.

I’m not sure what it is, but when I’m back in town, the city seems so foreign, like I’ve never even lived here. I don’t know if it’s because it’s been 14 years already since we left and the city has changed in so many ways, but it doesn’t pull at my heart strings when we cross the Columbia River on the interstate bridge from Washington to Oregon. The lack of emotional connection is so confusing seeing as how I’m usually so super nostalgic about everything. I’ll reminisce about certain places that we pass by…a store, a restaurant, or a street corner…and there are a number of places that have stuck around with plenty of opportunities to feel those pangs of nostalgia, but I feel more like a tourist than someone who is visiting their old haunts. I don’t quite understand why.

We had a fantastic 2 days over the weekend. I was happy to show the girls Powell’s Books and the Rose Garden. The roses were still in bloom and we walked around the gardens, sticking our noses close to the flowers, trying to find the best smelling rose. It’s amazing how different they all smell. We walked around the Pearl District, a neighborhood that didn’t exist when we lived there and had lunch in North Portland the first day we pulled in (what’s with all the stationery food trucks?). Dim Sum for Sunday brunch and ramen for dinner, right before we headed back north.

What does capture my heart is seeing our college friend and Portland housemate, Jason. This is the main reason we make the trip down. This is what it’s all about, isn’t it? In the end, the most significant memories are about the people.